Medusa
by Mutinous
Summary: "The Gerudo will tell tales of my chivalry for centuries. And you? You'll be nothing but dust." Nabooru shares a bitter exchange with Ganondorf on the eve of his sentencing to the Sacred Realm.


Nabooru paces the hall.

His infernal presence is impossible to ignore as it seeps from the door. Waves of malice are choking the air, obstructing her connection to the spirits, though she does her best to ignore it. Some ungodly light poured from his eyes the last time she looked upon them. It had very nearly drowned out the guttural screaming and _cursing, _from which her name soon followed.

_"Traitor!"_

His voice rattles through her mind, disrupting the silence. Most hear the monster when he speaks, but to her he's forever cursed to sound like a man. Like an old acquaintance, rotted out of her memories.

_"Your actions will bring nothing but ruin to our people! And you did it all to save yourself. You weak, conniving little girl. Don't you know your power and influence were all my doing?"  
_  
She swears in her language and kicks the floor, hating the way the chamber absorbs nearly all sound - with the exception of the words exchanged by the Sages. Most days, she marvels in the way it lifts her voice. How it magnifies her songs of the desert. Though at times like this, it's merely an inconvenience. Her hissing drifts upon the air, glancing over the pools of water that ebb and flow in this window between realms, before it reaches the ears of another.

Nabooru senses the change before she freezes. Her heart rushes in her ears and suddenly, she's more on edge than she's felt in years.

Her fingers grip to her scimitar before she spins. She half expects to see him there, leaning against the wall, arms folded before he would use them to choke the life from her. Instead, a set of crimson red eyes leers back at her from the dark. Immediately, she sheaths her sword and reverts back into her usual carefree demeanour. Her painted lips form into a lazy smile. Though she's never been caught stealing, she knows exactly how to twist her way out of trouble.

Impa steps into the light. Her mouth is set into a hard line. "Don't go in there," she warns in a frigid tone. "You'll only make it worse for yourself."

"Hah." Nabooru copies her stance and crosses her arms. Her smile never wanes, even as her eyes sharpen. "Worse than seven years of being that fool's puppet? Please, tell me more. I'd love to wake up and find the Gerudo in even more of a mess."

Impa refuses to react, and she knows that _she knows_ how much it bothers her. "We're all here for the same reason." But then, the Sheikah uncrosses her arms. "You, however, seem uniquely concerned with prolonging your pain. There's no use in it. No point driving the knife in deeper. By subjecting your emotions to his will, you are letting him win."

"Oh?"

The energy in her shifts and Impa blinks, just once.

"I don't need your judgment, shadow mistress..." Nabooru hisses. Though her voice is one that commands this realm, she finds herself drawing near, aiming it like an arrow at any who would stand in her way. "You act so high and mighty... but you can't honestly stand there and tell me you've never wanted to claw those years back. That you've never wanted to break every finger in his body for what he did to the king... or twist the knife on Princess Zelda's behalf."

Impa feels the anger rising inside. Her posture stiffens and the first soft touches of adrenaline take hold as she remembers the day the king was murdered. Zelda searches her face for assurance as she snatches the bag of provisions they packed just last night. They climb from the window of her room. It's eerily silent in the outer corridors of the castle. Without the screaming of the guards, she can finally instruct Zelda to uncover her ears. They're riding out of town when she turns her shoulder and _sees_ him right there, chasing their shadow. A terrible, twisted grin distorting his face. Eyes seething with hunger.

"Hmm. Did I touch a nerve?" Nabooru smirks. She runs her fingers through her ponytail before coiling it around the front of her neck.

The Sheikah looks to her again. This time she does not blink. "It is of no consequence now," she says simply.

"No consequence?"

Nabooru meets her gaze directly. Her eyes have the stare of a hawk, the gold of a huntress hungry for blood. "You see my anger and look down on it as a nuisance. But it is face often worn by the spirits. It is life, in its most pure and unrelenting form! I wouldn't expect any old _vai _of the Sheikah to understand but I'll be wearing it with pride when the void consumes him tomorrow. A sight like that will sustain me for the rest of time."

A cold hand perches onto her shoulder as she reaches for the door. "It won't bring the years back," Impa reminds her. "Our sacrifices were necessary for the power we wield now."

"Maybe." She turns and winks. "All the more reason to make it count. Now, let me go... unless you'd like to tag along?"

Impa steps back and vanishes into the shadows, and Nabooru sighs. The chamber falls silent once again.

She admits it; she envies the Sheikah for her stoicism. Life would be so much _easier _if she simply brushed her anger aside, if she could cut her emotions away and burn them before the Goddesses, all in the name of her higher purpose. As her hand lingers over the door handle, she realises the truth of the matter. Her fury is as much a part of her as being a Sage.

A monster waits behind every new smile and glimmer of teeth, every toss of her hair, shaking itself free from years of hibernation. It is ugly and exhilarating. A perfect storm to turn against him. She feels the spirits calling back to her, whispering through the veil of malice for the first time since his imprisonment.

_'Make him pay,' _they lament.

Nabooru opens the door.

A pang of nausea twists her stomach but she does not flinch. She draws upon her power to wrangle it down. It's dim but not entirely dark, reminiscent of her time in the Spirit Temple.

She scans the room before she sees him on the other side. A great, hulking mass of muscle and wild, unkempt hair. He's coated in dust from the fallen tower and the residual grime clings to him in swathes of green blood. As unsettling as his presence is, like a great black spider hunched against the wall, she reminds herself that he is utterly harmless. His limbs are bound to the cell by searing chains, weighed down by the wisdom of Nayru, herself.

He turns his head up to meet her glare. She expects him to smile but instead he stares back, expressionless, eyes bleeding through the gloom. "I didn't think I'd see you again so soon, my little pet," he sneers. "Are you here to release me? To beg for forgiveness?"

"Come on. We both know I'll never do that." She refuses to break eye contact as she lets herself into the cell, taking one long moment to imprint the sight into her memories. "How does it feel to watch it all crumble? Knowing you'll be sealed away for the rest of time... unmoving and irrelevant?"

The chains sear against his neck as he cranes his head, unyielding in his hatred. The spirits shudder and pull closer toward her.

"You will know this feeling soon enough, traitor. When our people go hungry again. When sickness pervades the desert nights. When they're pushed to the brink of existence by the Hylians, who you would betray them to save. Yes." He rumbles into that familiar laugh and she reins in her urge to spit at him. "The feeling will be all that's left to remind you that you were _ever_ one of them. As time passes, they will mourn my absence. The first and last of the Great Kings, the one and only... Ganondorf."

Nabooru watches as his mouth splits into a grin, wrinkling her nose at the smell of his searing flesh.

"History will mark you as their downfall, girl. Seven short years of prosperity, stolen from them by a common betrayer. A snake."

She feels a flicker inside. Her tongue. It suddenly longs to taste the air but she holds it back, opting to bite with her words, instead. "You dare to lecture me on the Gerudo?" she snarls, betraying her lofty demeanour. "You who _defiled _our temple and used it as a haven for brainwashing? Turning us into murders against our will?"

"I did not tell you to enjoy the killing," he answers quietly. "You did that all on your own."

At once, she's submerged in the horror of her past. She sits on the throne of the desert, smiling behind scales of gold armour. A woman her age is thrown to the floor - a defector, she's told - cornered and frightened. Her arm swings down like an axe and they drag her away. The woman haunts the wasteland of her dreams, calling to her through curtains of billowing sand. She never sees her again. _  
_  
He laughs and waits for her mind to come undone. Nabooru shuts her eyes and leans against the wall, feeling the spirits clotting together with psychic energy. They hone themselves into a shield.

"If we die at the hands of the Hylians, it will be your doing," she seethes. "You've never once acted in our stead. That is why the Gerudo will tell tales of my chivalry for centuries. And you? You'll be nothing but dust." She breathes in slowly, patiently, tasting his uncertainty before she speaks again. "Tell me, Ganondorf... first and last of the Great Kings. Do you remember the tale of our founding mother, the Goddess of Sand?"

"What?" he sneers, disgusted. "After worming your way in here, your great plan was to shake my throne with allegory and childhood sentiment? Pitiful. _Pathetic."_

"No? That's a shame." She exhales suddenly. He's too insulted to notice the headiness in her voice. "Maybe it'll come back to you. It's never too late to remember, you know?"

His bloodshot eyes bear back at her, cold and unimpressed. That's when he sees it.

A thin, forked tongue darts out from between her lips, withdrawing in a flash. Hissing rattles the bars of the cell. The air is hot and unpleasant and the walls are writhing with movement. He pulls against the chains and roars, his voice echoing in the chamber against her wicked hallucinations. It falls silent. He blinks. She's standing before him with a concerned frown. Leaning forward. Clicking her very human tongue as she shakes her head.

"What's the matter?" she asks. "You look like you've ssseen something unpleasant..." Her words curdle upon every syllable until they are dripping with strangeness.

Dirt trickles down the side of his face in the form of sweat. "What are you doing, woman?" The room grows hotter upon every word, scorching him with the bite of the sun. He's no stranger to the heat, but this time he can do nothing to escape it.

"Does_ thisss _unnerve you?"

He turns away from her, sickened and repulsed.

Serpents in black and red, olive and copper, are hissing and squirming, boring in through the backs of his eyelids. They're tangled together like chunks of hair. He resurfaces to the sight of Nabooru's face narrowing and twisting into something alien. He swallows his surprise. He has no idea if this is somehow his doing, though the magic feels unfamiliar. Older. Ancient.

The gold in her eyes spills over until it's all he can see. A thread line pupil slices down through the centre, narrowing in displeasure. The smell of carcasses permeates the air, cutting in over the stench of his wounds. He curses, loudly.

_"Perhapss you should have paid more attention to our legends," _she breathes.

It's no longer Nabooru. Light pours from her eyes as the energy wraps itself around her. Her hair splits into tendrils of moving flesh, armed with eyes and tongues and teeth of their own. Two long fangs erupt from her mouth as she commands his attention.

_"You should know that our founding mother came upon her power after sssuffering a great injustice at the edge of the desert, many hundredsss of years ago. She summoned an army of serpentsss from the ground to poison her enemies. Scavengers, scoundrels, ssservants of evil, whose bodies laid way for the oasis. They were ravaged by nightmares before they finally succumbed to their deathsss."_

The last of her humanity burns away as the bones in her body begin to snap and crack, elongating beyond their limit. Her skin shimmers as she moves. As much as she disgusts him, she is beautiful. He leans forward, heaving against the chains as he answers her. "You hold no power over me, you pitiful wench!"

_"Tomorrow, you will be petrified in the windsss of in time... for your crimes against the Gerudo, and our sisters and brothers in Hyrule,"_ she hisses into his ear. _"And there's not a single thing you can do to ssstop it."_

The last thing he remembers is being hit on the side of the neck. She slithers forward before her mouth unhinges in the most unholy way. She bites him. The sting is dull but it doesn't take long before the venom pierces holes into his vision. He slumps against the wall, listless, a roaring fire in his veins.

A rush of nightmares follows.

His castle thunders into the ground, pillars collapsing one on top of the other as they shake the earth. Not an ounce of rubble lands on the princess or her lapdog, and the mere sight of them crunches and pulls his body into something else. The Master Sword pierces into his skull and no amount of roaring can distract him from the pain. He hears her voice. "Six Sages, NOW!"

Then, he wakes up in the chamber. There's no sign of Nabooru until his sentence is carried out. They summon the portal in beams of vibrant light, splitting open the gates to the Sacred Realm. It's a colourless memory without sound or gravity. There's no sun or moon, no passing of time from which to measure his imprisonment. It is utterly devoid of life. In spite of this, it reaches into their world to consume him, eagerly.

He cannot hear himself scream as he falls inside and the portal closes.

_'Is this it?'_ he wonders. He drifts about in the fathomless expanse, unable to anchor himself. His thoughts blur into abstractions. Having them only reminds him of their uselessness, their powerlessness. There's no meaning, no chain of events lending themselves to the principle of cause and effect; only the raking of nails inside his head to remind himself of his existence. He waits for a thousand years, or so he feels.

Eventually he emerges from the fog, gasping for air.

The Sages watch silently as he drifts into the Sacred Realm for the second time.


End file.
